After my friends left and my pizza arrived, I had a heated discussion over economics with the couple sitting next to me. I’ve talked to this couple before (once) and I’ve seen them often. Like me, they’re Friday night regulars at the bar. The conversation began innocently enough – they wanted to know what I do. We’ve had that conversation before, maybe a year ago, but I guess they forgot. I felt mildly reassured in that my memory of what they did was spot on (so often I feel like I’m dull or losing my ability to remember things). If you ask me about what I do, my extended version will usually include a few talking points about fighting poverty and reducing homelessness. Responses are often polite and positive. People tell me it’s good work and important work. Sometimes, those responses are undercut by the listener’s feelings about the causes of poverty – which they’re all too willing to share. Those feelings usually fall along political party lines. Liberals tend to view poverty as a systemic and societal issue and conservatives tend to view it as a personal issue of poor work-ethic and bad choices. This couple very clearly fell into the conservative camp – the poverty as a character flaw camp.
Try as I might, I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to understand that point of view or the inconsistencies I see in their logic. In this particular case, the couple took pride in their religion and their charity through their church, yet the husband flat out said greed is good – as though channeling his inner Gordon Gekko. I’m pretty sure, Christ was not in favor of greed and we know that it’s been listed in Catholic theology as one of the “deadly sins.” Hypocrisy aside, I struggle to understand how people like the couple I spoke with come to worship the wealthy and show such disdain for the poor. This, too, feels very unchristian like and miserly in spirit. I mean, yes, I fundamentally understand it as part of the venerated “protestant work ethic” that underpins capitalism (thank you Max Weber), but we have lots and lots of historical examples that show luck and good fortune have at least an equal, and perhaps a greater, role in determining an individual’s financial success (see the opportunity atlas for considerations on how zip code determines social mobility). We also have lots and lots of historical examples of marginalized groups being intentionally denied access to finance, capital, and opportunity (see any history of race and/or redlining in this country).
Unfortunately, conversations like the one I had on Friday seldom go anywhere. My experience tells me that people who firmly believe the poor are just lazy or unwilling to better themselves are really trying to make the case for their own hard work and efforts. Their argument tends to sound like “I worked hard for what I have, why should they get it for free?” This was very true for this couple. Despite trying to keep things on a theoretical level, the wife kept pulling it down to the personal. She “worked her ass off why should that get taken away.” I find in these arguments, there’s often some phantom boogeyman always coming for what hard-working American’s have earned. Apparently, in her mind, I might be that boogeyman (by this point she had called me a communist). Though I have no policy-making powers in this world, I’m out to tax her and give it to lazy people who don’t want to work. Every time she hinted that I was coming for what she had worked her ass off for, I would correct her and say I never mentioned taxing her, but I do think we could start by taxing the extremely wealthy at different rates. Again I was told that’s communism as she argued that taxing like that is a disincentive for work. We don’t an any empirical evidence to support this. I suppose someone earning $10 million who might have their earnings knocked down to $5 million might be less incentivized to work… though prior to the 80s, tax rates for the extremely wealthy were at much higher rates and we didn’t have any incentive problems. Several reputable studies have shown that pay incentives can increase dishonesty and that pay does not necessarily encourage people to work harder. Given her line of argumentation, I began to wonder if we would call those who feel disincentivized by higher taxes lazy or if that’s a term we reserve for those earning $7.25 an hour.
As we discussed the finer points of capitalism, she said I resented rich people. I said I struggle with the ethics of extreme wealth. How can an entire class of people (the 1%) control so much while so many people suffer? How can we have an entire sector of our economy produce nothing but wealth for people of wealth, while we do so little to improve the earnings, healthcare, and sustainability of those who bag our groceries, teach our kids, or take care of our elderly? Ethically speaking, how can we allow billionaires to even exist when we have people experiencing homelessness and hunger? I had been raised on the belief that you don’t take second helpings of food until everyone has had a chance to eat, and that the truly generous person ensures everyone gets a slice before they take theirs (I’m almost always last in line at the office party buffet). Why can’t we apply that thinking to things like housing or economics?
In the course of our conversation, I had mentioned the names of a few of our more famous oligarchs (Elon, Jeff, and company). Again, it got personal and I was told they’ve done more for humanity by employing so many people than I ever will… and that without their charitable contributions, I wouldn’t have a job. My only response was that I’d happily stop working or go into a different field if they paid their employees better (here I’m thinking Walmart and Amazon) and my services were no longer needed. This is where I get very uncomfortable with the notion of philanthropy. In some respects, our very focus on wealthy donors perpetuates a system in which they have control. They pay low wages, build personal wealth, and keep people dependent on their generosity. I was somewhat astounded by this woman’s worship of the wealthy and how she kept bringing it back to any attack on them is somehow an attack on her – she repeated several times how she has worked her ass off… which I never called into question. For me, this discussion was never about her or her work-ethic and was entirely about her comfort (privilege) in casually assuming those who are worse off are in that position because they haven’t worked as hard. There was no consideration given to generational poverty, lack of opportunity, or simply the fact that she may have had considerably more advantages than most people. Admittedly, I tend to find the “pick yourself up by your bootstraps” crowd to be insufferable. Even when I tried to discuss inherited wealth (those with several sets of bootstraps that they’ve never had to use), she insisted that it was somehow earned (or worked for) because their parents or grandparents worked for it. As though we were talking about the divine right of succession of kings.
By the end of the night, I felt exasperated and my throat was soar (I had already been sick all week with a sore throat and talking didn’t help). I don’t mind encountering people with different opinions and views. I welcome the chance to see things from a different perspective. But that wasn’t how this played out. At one point, this woman gave the standard line “if I don’t like it here, I should go somewhere else” and at a different point, she suggested that our system of capitalism has put us at number one in just about everything. I asked her what data she had to prove that. She didn’t have any. I suggested she google where we stand on maternal mortality rates or other measures of social progress and well-being. She wasn’t interested. In the composite score of social progress, we rank about 24th or 25th in the world. Not number one. Not in the top five. Not in the top ten, or even the top twenty. In areas like “interpersonal violence,” and “discrimination and violence against minorities,” we’re not even in the top 100. This is anything but American Exceptionalism. My mistake in these encounters is that I’m often trying to bring logic and critical thinking to a feelings fight.
Unfortunately, far too often, the outcome of such debates is that both parties leave even more convinced they are right. I’m sure she and her husband are more entrenched in their defense of capitalism and I am more adamant in my critique of it. The conversation has hung with me for a few days (which probably has more to do with the personal nature of her comments than the validity of them). The lingering cloud of frustration feels especially prescient today on MLK day. King, though currently appropriated by everyone, was a democratic socialist and was very critical of the power dynamics and economic inequality found in capitalism. Among King’s many sayings that you won’t see on LinkedIn or Facebook or Twitter:
“Philanthropy is commendable, but it must not cause the philanthropist to overlook the circumstances of economic injustice which make philanthropy necessary.”
“Capitalism is always in danger of inspiring men to be more concerned about making a living than making a life. We are prone to judge success by the index of our salaries or the size of our automobiles, rather than by the quality of our service and relationship to humanity…”
I’m concerned, primarily, with making a life – one in which I build curiosity, compassion, and fairness and stamp out resentment, cruelty, and inequality. I believe we should work to reduce suffering, not insist on it just because we had it tough or because the system is designed that way. At the end of the night, my bar stool neighbor suggested that I want everyone to live in poverty. I replied by saying I want everyone to live in prosperity. To which she said I don’t live in reality and “good luck with that.” I know there is deep cynicism in the world and yet I’m always caught off guard when I encounter it face to face. Yes, prosperity for all is not our current reality – probably never will be. I suppose I choose idealism over cynicism, and maybe next time, I (or they) will choose a different seat.